Problem With Photo Slideshow Created With Vegas 15

Peter-Riding wrote on 8/10/2018, 6:12 AM

First off, I am entirely self-taught starting from Vegas Pro 9 and while I know many aspects in some depth, some others are rudimentary for me so apologies if I waste your time.

Ordinarily I use Vegas Pro 13 build 453 and thats been fine. Recently I bought 15 using the free to 16 upgrade offer. I have build 384. Maybe there is a problem with 15 or maybe I have simply been asking too much of my current hardware.

Windows 10 Pro 64 bit Version 1803 Build 17134.165 Intel i7 950 @ 3.07GHz RAM 12GB. Nvidia GTX570. The hardware is far from state of the art now but I'm avoiding a major update. VP13 has been fine, all be it the GTX570 was never a lot of use with Vegas for me.

Typically my end product includes a 1920x1080 MP4 file and a standard definition DVD. These are edited from various Canon dSLRs, including 5D Mark IV, 5D Mark II, 5DS-R, and recently the 6D Mark II, plus various standalone audio recorders. Previously I used various Panasonic camcorders and GoPros. The "chapters" are a mix of photos and video. One chapter might be a couple of dozen stills then the next chapter a full-on multicam video, then stills again etc.

I now want to create an MP4 file for stills only, comprising in this instance 205 photos over 14 minutes. I created it in Magix VP 15. Unfortunately the end result shows some flickering during some photos. This happens regardless of whether the rendering quality is very high, or low, and 1 pass or 2 pass. With 2 pass sometimes the rendering will freeze part way through.

The photos from various cameras were all edited from RAW in Capture One Pro to high quality JPEG, all in 3:2 aspect ratio. I then batch convert them in Photoshop to PNG and with a transparent background so that each photo can be dragged around anywhere I want in Event Pan/Crop. Landscape aspect is 3840x2560 (can then be cropped to 16x9 for full-screen in Event Pan/Crop) and portrait is 3840x2106. I had made a bunch of presets so that each photo can be positioned exactly where I want. There are three tracks so that up to three different photos can be seen at the same time, each fading in one after another. Its a lot easier than it seems by using my presets. Each photo is typically 6 seconds and with a 2 second transition within the 6 n.b. 2 secs transition, 2 secs full-on, 2 secs transition. I prefer this style of slideshow to many of the overly gimicky transitions and effects (years ago I used Proshow Producer).

The easiest way to see it in action is via this Youtube video:

The photo slideshow chapters have been fine for many years for me with Vegas up to 13, all be it the rendering does slow right down during that part. But the 15 version as in Youtube - and from a USB3 stick on my 4k TV shows the flickering as described earlier.

The Properties for the photo slideshow I used were as in Canon dSLRs for UK and are 1920x1080, progressive, pixel aspect ratio 1.0000, frame rate 25 (pal), full res rendering quality Best, motion blur gaussian, resample mode samet resample, adjust source media to better match project or render (ticked).

The Video Preferences are Dynamic Ram 200, max available 11255, max no. of rendering threads 32, GPU acceleration Nvidia GTX rather than "off" (though that doesn't even show as an option in the Magix Render Settings for AVC as expected).

Thanks very much for any suggestions.

For completeness I've pasted in the details from MediaInfo:

General
Complete name : I:\001_1st_features-galleries-100_WIP\elvetham hotel 100-118-a\photo-slideshow_vegas-pro-15_elvetham\elvetham-ps-008.mp4
Format : MPEG-4
Format profile : Base Media / Version 2
Codec ID : mp42 (isom/mp42)
File size : 1.06 GiB
Duration : 13 min 52 s
Overall bit rate mode : Variable
Overall bit rate : 10.9 Mb/s
Encoded date : UTC 2018-08-09 14:12:48
Tagged date : UTC 2018-08-09 14:12:48

Video
ID : 2
Format : AVC
Format/Info : Advanced Video Codec
Format profile : Main@L4
Format settings : CABAC / 3 Ref Frames
Format settings, CABAC : Yes
Format settings, RefFrames : 3 frames
Codec ID : avc1
Codec ID/Info : Advanced Video Coding
Duration : 13 min 52 s
Bit rate mode : Variable
Bit rate : 10.5 Mb/s
Maximum bit rate : 14.0 Mb/s
Width : 1 920 pixels
Height : 1 080 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 16:9
Frame rate mode : Constant
Frame rate : 25.000 FPS
Standard : PAL
Color space : YUV
Chroma subsampling : 4:2:0
Bit depth : 8 bits
Scan type : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 0.203
Stream size : 1.02 GiB (96%)
Language : English
Encoded date : UTC 2018-08-09 14:12:48
Tagged date : UTC 2018-08-09 14:12:48
Color range : Limited

Audio
ID : 1
Format : AAC
Format/Info : Advanced Audio Codec
Format profile : LC
Codec ID : mp4a-40-2
Duration : 13 min 52 s
Bit rate mode : Variable
Bit rate : 384 kb/s
Maximum bit rate : 454 kb/s
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Channel positions : Front: L R
Sampling rate : 48.0 kHz
Frame rate : 46.875 FPS (1024 SPF)
Compression mode : Lossy
Stream size : 37.8 MiB (3%)
Language : English
Encoded date : UTC 2018-08-09 14:12:48
Tagged date : UTC 2018-08-09 14:12:48

Comments

Former user wrote on 8/10/2018, 7:19 AM

Looks like a GPU rendering problem.

j-v wrote on 8/10/2018, 7:25 AM

It looks that your very old GTX is helping with rendering, but to be sure publish your exact rendertemplate and show us clearly the encode mode.

Or try to use this one

Peter-Riding wrote on 8/10/2018, 7:47 AM

Thanks David and j-v for your swift reply to my long message. I've attached a jpeg of one of the versions of AVC rendering that I'd tried without success. I used lower max and average variable bit rates, one as low as 14 max 10 average, and with 1 and 2 pass. As you can see, in VP15 you don't get to choose GPU anyway as Magix doesn't include a GPU choice in the custom settings if the 570 is unsupported (though strangely it is featured in the Preferences > Video Options).

I wonder if there is a fairly lossless intermediate render that i could then put through AVC.

Alternatively, since AVC Main Concept has been working in VP13 fine all be it for much shorter photo slideshow elements, I may try rendering the 14 minute show in 7 x 2 minute ones then pulling all 7 together and rendering one large 14 minute MP4 from the 7 x 2 minute MP4's. That would avoid all those transitions and large PNG files. Its a pain but I don't need to do this length of show very often.

I'm avoiding hardware updates for now until 4k etc evolves further and the hardware / software won't necessarily need to involve proxy files.

Former user wrote on 8/10/2018, 7:51 AM

Try turning the GPU off in preferences and render.

Kinvermark wrote on 8/10/2018, 10:18 AM

Ya, that's definitely not normal. Along with turning off gpu support, I would also try rendering to an intermediate like MagicYUV (lossless avi) or XAVC-I and then encoding that file in Handbrake. I don't have time to read through all your details, but if you haven't already resized your photos to nearer the final resolution, that may help.

BruceUSA wrote on 8/10/2018, 10:46 AM

The Properties for the photo slideshow I used were as in Canon dSLRs for UK and are 1920x1080, progressive, pixel aspect ratio 1.0000, frame rate 25 (pal), full res rendering quality Best, motion blur gaussian, resample mode samet resample, adjust source media to better match project or render (ticked).

You need to set deinterlaced to NONE and disable resample in Project Properties. . I have done many slideshow with full size Jpeg from 5D3 and samsung camera that is 28M full size. Drop all that in the TL. No need to resized anything. Heck, I can even drop raw file on the TL and still able to edit and render without any flickering.

Kinvermark wrote on 8/10/2018, 10:51 AM

Stop bragging about the size of your computer again Bruce. 😀

Resizing MAY help, as clearly his system is struggling and thus throwing bad frames.

BruceUSA wrote on 8/10/2018, 11:24 AM

Stop bragging about the size of your computer again Bruce. 😀

Resizing MAY help, as clearly his system is struggling and thus throwing bad frames.

This is not a bragging at all. I have never resize my jpeg for slideshow, ever. I have been doing it this way more then 3 yrs ago with old i7 6 core computer.

LongIslander wrote on 8/10/2018, 11:57 AM

Try turning the GPU off in preferences and render.

This is the fix...

https://www.vegascreativesoftware.info/us/forum/flicker-after-render-transitions-solved--112386/

Kinvermark wrote on 8/10/2018, 12:29 PM

It is ONE POSSIBLE fix. I use GPU when rendering and do not have these problems.

It's a good thing for the OP to try, but it is not a GENERIC solution to all ills.

Peter-Riding wrote on 8/10/2018, 4:13 PM

Thanks everyone for all your help, and so quickly. Resolved now :- )

There were indeed two issues hiding in plain sight in the form of the GPU.

The first is I assumed that in the VP15 PDF manual "only compatible devices are displayed in the list" n.b. don't therefore show in the Main Concept AVC templates, that this meant the GPU would not be used at all. Wrong. And having been studying the Preferences it was then obvious to switch off my 570 GPU in the Preferences > Video tab. It had been on by default from the install. I was aware of the never-ending discussions regarding GPU's and Vegas going back years and a long time ago I had killed the GPU for rendering AVC's but sometimes had it on for editing up to VP13.

The second is possibly a MVP15 issue in that I never used to get the flickering up to and including VP13. But switching off the GPU has solved that.

With the GPU switched off I can now render a very meaty MP4 at variable bit rate 24 and average 14. And with 2-pass. I always preferred 2-pass for photos as I'd found with 1-pass some photo compositions such as including brick walls within the depth of field can be inferior. The 14 minute 205 photo show with lots of transitions renders in just under a hour, which is fine for me. Straight video to MP4 or anything to standard def DVD is far quicker anyway even taking into account 2-pass AVC.

That show is 1.4gb as MP4. It runs fine on my desktop and laptop and on the revised downscaled version on Youtube. It doesn't like my LG 55" OLED TV via a USB3 stick- it stutters sometimes - so I'll render a lighter version.

BTW meant to say in my earlier spec. that the desktop C drive is a 500gb Crucial SSD and is only used for the programs. The media is on a USB3 fast external hard drive, one of many, and has been fine for years. I've also been a heavy user of nested projects.

Bruce: I understand what you're saying about resizing photo files. I just prefer a different workflow where the capture and intermediate sharpening are done in Capture One Pro then the output sharpening either in C1 for prints, photo albums, and web pages, or in Photoshop specifically for Vegas. I resize the Vegas images in Photoshop Bicubic Automatic to twice their 1920x1080 max to allow for some zooming etc. then output sharpen. I changed my Vegas Project Properties to default Deinterlace None and Disable Resample as you suggested. It rings a bell but I can't remember why I used to do that as all my video files were progressive anyway. Thanks.

For completeness, I've removed the first version of the slideshow and upload the new version:

I have got a license for the music including online but I can't really be bothered as viewers are so used to having ads popping up.

BruceUSA wrote on 8/10/2018, 6:41 PM

Peter. I am glad you got it all fixed. Your new version video look great. When I do slideshow. I edited my raw file in Lightroom and output full size jpegs and drop them on Vegas . I chose not to resize because there no need to spent more time on it when you Don't have to. Unless you are using a very old computer. I would say any 2nd or 3rd gen i7 will be able to handle full size jpegs on Vegas time line with out any problems. But if you choose to resize it any way that is cool to.